The Corpse Groom
by christinesays
Summary: Victor and Victoria have been married for a while now, he's content. Then he meets a young girl, no more than the age of seven. She has Emily's hair, lips and cheeks yet...Lord Barkis's eyes. He's taken aback, especially since she's alive.
1. Chapter 1

**Can A Heart Break****…****While It****'****s Still Beating?**

He sighed heavily, although barely audible, as he went to kiss his wife on the cheeks. Her very pale face lit up with a pale pink as she smiled.

"I won't be gone long, now. Now, you know what to do while I'm away?"

"Yes, dear." He grinned half heartedly, reassuring her that he was quite capable of taking care of himself. She straightened his lapel and smoothed his jacket, a nervous tick she had always done. She refused to look him in the eyes as she placed her hand on his tie. Victor placed his own hand on his wife's.

"Everything's will be fine. Now please take care of your ailing aunt so so she doesn't…uh…um.. y-you know.." He fumbled over his words, trying to avoid the subject of no avail, Victoria's pupils grew dull, glazed over. Heat began to rise in his neck and he picked at his collar to get some cool. Victor knew very well how she dealt with the idea of passing and the underworld. Many years have passed in the married life and it was very obvious that they were committed to each other. _**Until death do us part, right?**_ He thought quietly to himself. Yet, whenever the dead or deceased arises in conversation Victoria grinds her teeth just a bit. Uneasy with the subject, for it reminds her of…_her._ The married couple have never discussed this issue, because there was never any issue to discuss. Victoria, at the most, gets just uncomfortable and one can barely notice. But to Victor, he catches it every time.

"I love you. Safe travel, darling." Bidding her goodbye, he placed a kiss on her forehead. She smiled to herself and wrapped her hand around her husband's, giving it a final squeeze, before letting go. She stepped in the carriage, never taking her eyes of Victor. Their gaze remained unbroken, even when Victor could no longer make out the silhouette. He stood there on the steps of his house, alone.


	2. Chapter 2

**Pardon My Enthusiasm…**

He sat at his bench, playing keys on the random. He scribbles them done a scrap of paper aboard the piano. He puts down the quill beside the well. He waves his hand gently in front of the sheet, drying it faster.

"Ahem. Yes, now from the top." Victor placed his hands upon the keys, drew in a breath, and began to play. The dull gray room began to fill with a soft melody. Starting as a low and solemn tune then growing into a full and light song. All that was missing were some strings and an angelic voice. Victor was truly brilliant when it came to the piano. He'd had much practice, since he's had one for his own for so long.

An anniversary present that Victoria had bought, dipping into their funds and splurging on this lovely grand piano for him. He was ecstatic and thanked her mercilessly. Played it everyday, filling their home with constant music that Victoria loved to cook and clean to. Victor had even made a job out of it, the church needed someone to play the organ for weddings, but more often funerals. His wife disliked that even after all that had happened, he was still so close to the dead, but she complied. Victor's mind blanked as he played the notes in order, swelling in tune. The pitch began to rise as his hands gradually moved up octaves into the higher range. The song grew lighter and lighter as it reached its end.

Finally, it reached its final few notes. He ended it by sliding his hand across the keys, bottom to top, creating jump in pitch. His fingers stopped at two keys and made them dance on those couple of keys, a reminder of someone dear to him. He chuckled at his silliness. Victor, to this day still thought about her, but just every now and then. His nostalgia came to such an abrupt stop when he heard the sharp **_snap! _**

Victor's held notes suddenly disappeared, cut short. He gasped and retracted his hand from the board. Silence, it filled the room as he remained quiet and just listened. He looked curiously at his precious instrument and stood up from his seat. He walked over to its side and lifting it's heavy case. The wire had snapped in half.

"Oh, dear." Worriedly, Victor closed it and set his music sheets aside. His gaze shifted to the grandfather clock. Just a little before noon. The thought of lunch caused a guttural growl from his stomach.

"Well, then. It's settled, I'll go get a replacement wire then grab a bite on the way home." He went to gather his coat and keys.


	3. Chapter 3

**If only he could see how special you can be…**

He strolled the cobbled streets taking in the fresh air. It smelled damp and wet stone filled his nose. The skies were, as per usual. This small town never

"Good afternoon, Mr. Van Dort." A child squeaked as the passed by.

"And to you too, Benjamin." The boy chased a girl down the road as she shrieked away. Children, such a nice thought. A boy and a girl, around the same age, that would be ideal. The older brother as the protector and the guardian.

"Good afternoon there, Mr. Van Dort." The thick accent nearly drowned out by the sound of clattering hooves and rickety wheels. An elderly voice spoke his name and Victor's head turned towards. It was the the carriage driver, high up on his seat. He craned his head to the man, and his gaze was greeted by a wrinkled old smile.

"Hello, there Mr. Humphrey-" His greeting cut short by the deafening sound of Mr. Humphrey's wheel. It was about to crack at any moment.

"Mr. Humphrey, y-y-your wheel-"

"Oh yeah, that bloody thing. Well, can't afford a new one. Ha! Let it last, I say! If It breaks, I kick the bucket, well then." He cackled with a shrug of his shoulders.

"I'll just say 'hi' to your little lady then, won't I?" With a click of his tongue and a wink of his eye, Victor's face began to heat up with embarrassment. That devil, him, he knew very well he was married. Hell, half the town knew, everyone was there at the wedding. The _real _wedding. Although, Nigel Humphrey saw the whole ordeal. He was one of the few people who saw him on the bridge with her. Knew all about her and then Victoria, and he frankly didn't take too much to her.

"Nigel, I keep telling you, She's-"

"Ya, shut yer trap there boy. That other lassie got more heart than your broad, and I ain't so sure she even had a heart." Mr. Humphrey chortled to himself as he rode sighed and slumped his shoulders. His eyebrows furrowed in discomfort, he loved his wife dearly and that comment bothered him greatly.

Victor cleared his throat to rid his head of those thoughts. He began his way to that music store. Strolling along the streets, muttering himself about what had just happened until he reached his destination.

**Eleanor Music**

His hand clenched around the door knob and pushed it open. There was a ear splitting creak caused from the hinges followed by a soft jingle of the welcome bell. At that sound, a head of gray and white whipped to face him.

"Well Victor, dear. I can't say much surprised to see you here." An elderly figure rose from behind the counter. She was so frail and delicate. It appeared that if you would just breathe on her she would disintegrate. She wore a shawl around her neck and her wiry hair worn in a loose fitting bun. Eleanor had a slight hunch as she sauntered towards Victor.

"What're you here for? Sheet music? I just acquired a few. Freshly pressed."

"Oh no. Thank you very much though, Eleanor." He shook his head. "A piano wire snapped."

"Goodness! Say no more, child!" She slowly walked towards her mahogany glass counter. She took tiny steps and it reminded Victor of a tiny wind up doll. Eleanor looks so petite and motherly. It was a shame she could bear no children. Sadness struck his face and you could tell it was longing.

"Here, you go dear." Eleanor beckoned Victor as she retrieved a big wooden box from he counter. She struggled and plopped the heavy object on the surface, causing the whole table to shake. It was long and covered in thick layer of dust. Eleanor huffed and a big cloud billowed in front of Victor. He went into a mad coughing fit, almost ejecting his lungs.

"Oh, my apologies, Victor sweet. It's been awhile since customers buy piano parts. I guess it's just not popular in this town." Her face went into a soft smile, but she was anything but happy.

"It really is a shame." Eleanor nodded her head in agreement and lifted the heavy lid. Her fingers ran over each wire then picked the shines and most durable wire. It was coiled neatly and wrapped with tiny silk ribbon. She handed it to Victor, and his hand went to his pocket.

"No need, child."

"But-"

"You've kept this little shop alive for so long, a loyal dog needs to be thrown some scraps every once in a while." She teased and prodded at Victor. **_Oh…scraps…_** Victor thought to himself. His poor dog. He wondered how he was doing right now, below him. Probably chasing some maggot or Paul the head waiter.

"Thank you very much Eleanor. You're too kind and I will pay..you..interest….."

Victor's voice was drowned out by a growing melody emitting from the back room. It was music being played on the piano. Soft, very simple notes, nothing elaborate. But it was too familiar.

"This song…" Victor said aloud, his eyes were blank, mind focused on the keys. Eleanor looked up at Victor. Her eyes followed his gaze to the back room. The source was coming from there. Victor made a straight beeline to the doorway.

"I know this.. only I know this.." He opened the half cracked door fully, although he was not ready for what was behind.

A piano, old and run down. Clearly had been used for years, but from the sound of it it worked well. It was flash against the back wall. What Victor saw was the outline of a small girl, she looked infantile and petite. At the sound of the door opening she ceased her playing and froze in her awkward place.

"I'm terribly sorry for barging in."

Nothing.

"..but… that song. How do you know it?" That question came out more abrasive than Victor would have liked, but that melody was impossible to know.

Nothing at all.

It was too unique to be relocated accidentally, it was very uncommon. Victor played that song with only one other person… and she had left this world.

The young one remained silent. Not saying a word, or looking like she even wanted to converse. She just sat on that piano bench body facing the piano, her fingers were hovering above the keys. **_What's wrong with her? She seems a little…off putting. _**Victor wondered to himself when a voice came up behind him.

"Dear, I'm sorry but this is a private lesson and Im afraid the girl isn't too fond of people." Eleanor put a hand on Victors shoulder, gently showing him the way out.

"Yes and I'm sorry, but she knows that song. It's not possible." He refused to move and Eleanor retracted her hand.

"Who taught you that, dear?" Victor questioned in a soft tone. He took a step towards her. He expected a knee jerk reaction on her part, but she didn't move an inch. It was eerie how emotionless she looked from the back. She seemed possessed. Finally, after a minute of just dead pan silence, the child turned to face Victor.

"Oh my.."

Her eyes were wide which were framed by lengthy lashes. Hair. long and wavy. It ran along her back in soft cascading streaks of light brown. She had pale skin, but her cheeks were naturally rosy pink which coincidentally matched her sweetheart lips. Her nose was a sharp and tiny point. This young girl could not be more than eight or seven years old. She remained unmoved.

So still, she resembled a doll. A delicate porcelain doll. Not like the poems compare every tiny female, she really did have makings of a life sized doll. Her features were so sharp and unreal they looked to be painted on her skin. She was staring at Victor, bit she did not move, or blink. Perfectly still, almost lifeless. You couldn't even see her chest rise and fall with breaths, she did not look.

Her face. Her face. Her face..

"Emily?" Victor squeaked out. He couldn't find his breath.

Her face, it was not hers. It was not of this world. This child's face belonged to the gone and forgotten. So did her eyes. Her pupils, were dark and beady…like a man. A familiar man. This doll's eyes were bottomless and looked of inherited evil. Victor had peered into eyes like those before, but it was when he faced death itself. Flashbacks of a facing blade and a goblet of red liquid pushed into his mind.

He stumbled back a few steps, catching himself on a nearby stand. Victor felt his head grow light, but his body grew heavy. The knees began to buckle and he fell to the floor.


	4. Chapter 4

**Death has already parted you..**

"My God.." His trembling hand covered his mouth. The little girl tilted her head in speculation.

"Victor? Victor?!" Eleanor rushed to his side, kneeling on the ground. Victor was having a severe case of the shakes. Evidence beingHis pupils were the size of dish plates and as pale as he was, he was the color of paper. His stomach was churning and even though he had not eaten, felt like he was going to vomit gallons.

"Emily?" She repeated, turning her body towards him, still sitting on the piano bench.

"Do you know her?" Her voice was so soft, almost a murmur.

"Sweetheart, please not now. Victor seems extremely upset. Now's not the time for those type of questions." The elderly women scolded softly. The seven year old nodded and stayed silent, hands folded across her lap. She looked so well behaved, but somehow she had a hollow demeanor. Eleanor turned her attention back towards the frightened young man.

"Victor, darling, I'm sorry. What's wrong are you alright?" She put a withering hand to his forehead to check temperature. No fever, so he could not be having an episode. In fact, he was icy cold. All the heat and blood has vanished from his face.

His eyes were stuck on the little girl's gaze. She seemed so desolate and empty. It was just so startling how much the young girl did look like a doll. A puppet whose actions are controlled by someone. All but alive.

Why couldn't she show just the tiniest bit of emotion? A smirk? A giggle? Even an intimidating glare?

There was nothing, but a piercing blank stare. No matter where you looked it seemed her eyes would follow, even if her pupils never moved. Such as a painting whose eyes followed you around the room. This girl, who bore a striking resemblance, looks like an inanimate object. Dolls, paintings, marionettes. She was closer to a cadaver than a human.

"Yes, Eleanor, I'm alright. I apologize for the scene. It's just that-" She held a hand to hid face, cutting him off before he could he even finish his sentence.

"Her appearance, yes I already know." Solemnly, she nodded her head. Revealing her secret, and by the looks of it, felt guilty. Victor's head whipped around to face the elder. His eyes spoke of disbelief and betrayal, but mostly confusion.

"Pp-p-pardon?" He scrambled for words and he brushed the hair from his face nervously. His brain was doing somersaults and he felt like he was going to black out. So many things he had to deal with, like an assault to his psyche.

"You know? Miss Eleanor, how do you know this girl?" His voice was shaking causing his voice to waver. The subject of their conversations seemed all but attentive. She was looking at the paintings upon the wall. In her own little world it looked like, very oblivious.

"I've taken her in Victor." She finally admitted. Her eyes filled with sadness and Victor, without speaking, understood completely. Eleanor never married, she was a spinster, someone who never married. Although, this was by choice, and she had _many_ choices. She never wanted anyone, no one was good enough for her. Her standards were raised so high by the previous and she had too much pride to lower them. Some would say and old cow or kook, she was just still in love. Her younger years were kind to her since she was probably the town beauty.

Her door was constantly being knocked on by suitors and boys professing their love. And her parents, much like Victoria, were forcing her to be married to someone of wealth. There were many men, some rich or poor, but Eleanor didn't really care for them. They were boring, none of them amazed or interested her. They all wanted her for her beauty and that was a concept in which she did not agree with. They wanted to marry her without even hearing a word from her mouth and this angered her. Eleanor had a much more advanced way of thinking he the people of her time, she chose love and companionship rather than toleration.

All the males who had asked for her hand wanted her for her looks, nothing else. She was a trophy that would be won and Eleanor did everything in her power to oppose it. Her compassion was equally matched by her stubborn will.

Bored at home she would often roam the town, finding anything that could bide her time. Whether it be throwing stones at the windmills to climbing the woodland trees for fun. None of which her parents approved, but they understood that they could not stop her.

Then one week, something new happened. The circus came to town. Eleanor had never been happier once she saw the posters. She left to go see it alone since all of her 'friends' thought it was childish. When they would be doing what? Sitting at home reading scriptures? **_Sounds so thrilling I might blow my head straight off.. _**Her exact words were.

When she arrived she couldn't believe her eyes. There were treats, a sticky sweet aroma filled the air. It was warm and there were lanterns all around. The tent was old and tattered, but it added to the atmosphere. There were animals she could pet, jugglers she could see. Everything amazed her. Something the boring little town could never do. There were men on horses doing tricks, and foreign men swallowing knives. Eleanor was ecstatic, she had never seen anything like it.

As she was walking into the tent a lively jive began playing in her ears. She spun and there was a boy. Maybe a few years older than her, . He had shaggy black hair and the brightest eyes you could ever dream of. He stood on a hay bale by the wooden fence where the horses were tied to.

He was playing the violin, but in an upbeat way that you could do nothing else but dance to. All around him men, women and children were prancing around to the wonderful song. Eleanor stared, awestruck, at the young man playing the fiddle.

She had seen an instrument like that before, he father played it, but whenever he did it was slow and depressing. It made her want to go to bed. But the way he used it made it so she wanted to stay awake and be there forever. Her heart filled with joy and excitement.


	5. Chapter 5

Eleanor had realized she had been staring for much too long because she caught his eye. They made eye contact and Eleanor, still to this day, swear she felt something went down her spine.

She quickly turned away, embarrassment struck across his face. Her blue eyes tore from his gaze and she avoided looking at her for the duration of the song. She shuffled into the tent, hoping to avoid that little awkward moment. Little did she know after she had gone the violinist stole glances.

Eleanor walked between the drawn curtains and was hugged with immediate were lights on strings strewn across the ceiling and there was a frenzy of performers. It was complete chaos, but in a way she relished it. She felt surround by wonder. The painted clown upon wooden stilts who towered above her. The mustachioed man juggling fire in a perfect circle before dropping one of the torches in his mouth. A woman locked in a box no bigger than a trunk. All these people doing extraordinary feats that seemed impossible, only things she would read in children's novels, none of them real.

A small child with a painted face and colorful clothing walked up to Eleanor and tapped her arm. She turned to see him presenting a tray which was filled to the sides of apples with protruding sticks.

"Sweet, miss?"

"I'm sorry, what?"

"Candied apple, courtesy of the event ma'am." She gave the young one a puzzled look before hesitantly grabbing the wooden handle.

"Excuse me, but what's a candied apple? I've never heard of these." Eleanor tucked a lock of hair behind her ear as she studied the treat. It shone brilliantly against the soft lighting. A golden brown covered a perfect red apple. She tapped the brown draping to find out it was hard, almost like glass.

"You have never heard of candy apple?" Eleanor's head craned up to see piercing green. Her breath hitched as the voice chuckled then took a candy apple from the boy's tray.

"It's one of the most delicious and sweet things on this earth, my dear." He took a bite of his apple. A crisp crunching sound which made Eleanor's mouth water.

"Well, almost." The man spoke between chews, sneaking a wink at Eleanor. The boy scurried off with the tray for he had other customers to attend to. Her fair face lit up pink and her temperature rose. This hadn't really happened before, usually she's so calm and collected.

"Has a pretty lady, like yourself, never head of candied apples?" She shook her head in response and the strapping man raised an eyebrow at her.

"A man should shower her lady with all things that remind him of her. As per example," He raised has hand to display the apple on a stick. ",candied apples for a sweet girls such as yourself."

Other ladies would be flattered and fall into his arms begging for a kiss, but Eleanor just rolled her eyes and let out an exasperated sigh. He was taken aback at her reaction, clearly her expression is not what he was used to.

"You don't even know my name, yet you're estimating that I'm sweet." The young man's face displayed nothing but confusion.

"For all you know I could be a psychopathic killer. I could rip children out of their beds and feast on their flesh." Her retort was sure to send him running, it usually did for most men. But just like the reaction Eleanor gave him, he surprised her.

"Is that the deal you made with Lucifer to gain that supernatural beauty, miss?" She was aghast, but secretly intrigued at his humor and wittiness.

"Yes, I steal children from they beds. I eat their souls. I am thing their parents warn them about."

"So you creep into their bedrooms when their most vulnerable?"

"Yes, I just said that."

"Children?"

"Yes."

"Bedrooms?"

"Yes."

"Is there a limit on age, miss?"

"I-"

He winked at her at and before Eleanor could scold him, he took her hand and ran off.


End file.
